MY DEAR MRS. PROCTER (for Madam, somehow, is
not the thing),
I am most pleased to be reminded of my promise, which I must have made
if you say I did. I suppose I have been coming to keep it ever since;
but it is a long road from sorrow to joy, and one is apt to get
confused on the road. Do you know your letter brought the tears into
my eyes? I hardly know why, unless it was that I saw Procter had been
pouring his kind heart into yours, and you said:--'We must have him
here instead of the coffee-house, and plant him by the fire, and warm
him like a stray bird till he sings.' But indeed a kind word affects
me where many a hard thump does not. Nevertheless, you must not tell
this, except to the very masculine or feminine; though if you do not
take it as a compliment to yourself,--I mean the confession of
my weakness,--why, you are not Procter's wife, nor Mrs. Montagu's
daughter, nor she who wrote the letter this morning to a poor battered
author.
PS. I eat any plain joint, of the plainer order, beef or mutton:--and
you know I care for nothing at dinner, so that it does not hurt me.
Friends' company is the thing.